Thursday, July 14, 2011

I wasn't kidding when I said I was born 200 years after my time

As I mentioned previously, SuperFresh had a great sale going on blueberries a couple of weeks ago. Between baking and eating, we went through most of our first 6 pints before the week was out, so I stopped by on my way home from work and got more. It was a crazy amount of blueberries for 3 people, but there aren't many things that Gabriella likes more than blueberries and peanut butter and jelly, so I wanted to make some blueberry jam.
I love making canned goods, it's really not THAT hard, but people don't do it, so when you do the general public seems to think you're amazing. I look for any opportunity to stoke my ego, trust me.
Anyhow, to make this jam you need

Fruit

Sugar

Acid (either lemon or lime juice)
Jars. Maybe. More on that in a minute
I decided to make one batch of blueberry jam and one batch of mixed blueberry and strawberry jam. For each one you need 6 cups of berries (the mixed I did in a 1:1 ratio, so 3 cups of each), 3 cups of sugar and 1/4 cup of the acid. Easy peasy recipe, just like I told Peter when he was concerned that I be able to remember and duplicate the results in the future.
For the actual jam making, you combine the fruit and sugar and cook over medium heat until it reaches the gelling point.

You then add the acid and cook for a few minutes. If you're afraid of canning, you could just refrigerate it and use it quickly, but since it makes a decent amount, it would make more sense to suck it up and learn how to can things safely.
Obviously, the big enemy with preserving food is bacteria. No one wants botulism. There are tons of resources out there which detail the correct methods to follow, so I'll sum up with clean equipment and a proper processing time at a full rolling boil if using a hot water bath method.
After boiling to sterilize, you keep the jars in hot water until the jam is ready to fill them
 After filling the jars, I boiled them for 15 minutes, then let them cool for  before taking them out of the bath. I'm pretty sure that every jar sealed as I lifted them out of the water.

The strawberry-blueberry mix set up a little better than the straight blueberry, but they are both definitely firm enough to use as jelly. I ended up with 5 half pint jars of mixed berry and 4 half pints of blueberry. We've enjoyed the mixed with peanut butter and on some delicious crepes stuffed with nutella and banana.

3 comments:

  1. Easy peasy recipe, just like I told Peter when he was concerned that I be able to remember and duplicate the results in the future.
    And now it's saved on the internet forever, so we can make it again, and again, and...

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  2. Never canned but you have me ready to try it! Have you ever done it with Elderberries. So far we only have had it from the Trapist Monks and it may well be my favorite!

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  3. The fact that you do all of this and AREN'T a stay-at-home mom is mindblowing.

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